Documentary to throw light on massive gap in pupil-teacher ratio

Times of India: Hyderabad: Syed Mohammad: Sunday, March 26, 2017.

To throw light on the condition of government-run schools in the state, the Telangana unit of the Students' Islamic Organisation (SIO) will release a documentary on the subject.

The documentary titled 'Dreams Choked' will focus on government-run schools in rural areas. The makers of the documentary said that the concept was a result of a Right To Information (RTI) query on the pupil-teacher ratio in government schools.

"We spoke to a lot students from classes III, IV and V. Even they are aware of the lack of infrastructure. Their level of awareness is high. They expressed their interest to change the system so that the infrastructure changes," said SIO president Laeeq Ahmed Khan, adding that the SIO team also interviewed teachers, headmasters and parents.

"While the level of enthusiasm for education remains high in the early stages of schooling, it is observed that their aspirations slowly fade away as they reach higher classes. The title of the documentary is after this," Khan said.

The sample survey covered one school in Adilabad district, two in Nizamabad and two more in Karimnagar.

Others, who were involved in the project, like Talha Faiyazuddin, one of the researchers, said, "We have filed the RTI in order to understand the pupil-teacher ratio in state schools. We also got the data on infrastructure. We wanted to compare the answers with the stipulations of the Right to Education Act. So, we came up with this documentary." But, Telangana follows the District Information System (DIS) standards for pupil to teacher ratio.

The makers of the documentary said that the data obtained showed disparities in four schools in the rural areas of the three districts.

This encouraged them to investigate. "There was large-scale disparity in the pupil-teacher ratio. One school has only two teachers for 250 students. This means that only two teachers will have to cater to all subjects," Faiyazuddin said. The documentary is slated for release on March 31.

In the recent past, SIO released a booklet, 'Education in Telangana', on the state of affairs in the education sector in the state. The student body expressed grave concern over the low budgetary allocations for education. It urged the government to allocate more funds and also increase spending. It also criticised the government for delay in releasing KG to PG document even as it demanded better education infrastructure and that of social welfare hostels in particular.